The twentieth century includes Richard Strauss and Hugo vonHofmannsthal (Elektra, Der Rosenkavalier, Ariadne auf Naxos, Die Frauohne Schatten, and Arabella) and Giacomo Puccini with his team ofGiuseppe Giacosa and Luigi Illica, creating three cornerstones oftoday’s operatic repertory: La Bohème, Tosca, and Madama Butterfly.Several composers preferred to create their own libretti, mostnotably Richard Wagner for all his operas and Alban Berg forWozzeck and Lulu.

Although the process of creating a libretto is straightforward, it is adifficult one—particularly with temperamental librettists and strong-willed composers. After the selection of the source material, be itbased on any combination of an original idea, a novel, or a stage play,a text must be produced, usually first in the form of a prose scenario.

Dr. Evan Baker is an educator, writer, and lecturer on operatichistory and production. He contributes regularly to several publi-cations, including San Francisco Opera Magazine.

reating an opera libretto for a demanding composer isdifficult, hard work. Very few librettists ever are successful,

let alone remembered by the public for their output. How-ever, several prominent pairings of librettists and composers creat-ing immortal masterpieces began in the eighteenth century withWolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Lorenzo da Ponte (Le Nozze diFigaro, Don Giovanni, and Così fan tutte). Giuseppe Verdi stood out inthe nineteenth century first with Francesco Maria Piave (Ernani,Rigoletto, La Traviata) followed by Arrigo Boito (Otello and Falstaff).

BY EVAN BAKER

La Bohème

“A gay life, and a terrible one!”

The Making of the Libretto for

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Versification follows, with the words set to poetic and distinct rhyth-mic meters in hopes of producing a coherent and singable text with aclear dramatic structure that the composer can set to music. The pos-sibility that a libretto might stand on its own as literature is rare.Many poets and playwrights intensely disliked being librettists, consid-ering it to be demeaning and unrewarding hackwork.

During the composition of his Manon Lescaut in 1892, Puccinibecame acquainted with Giuseppe Giacosa and Luigi Illica. Earlier,Giacosa had proposed a Russian-themed libretto to Puccini but itwas politely declined. About the same time, Puccini was havinggreat problems with the chaotic state of the libretto for ManonLescaut. Giulio Ricordi, Puccini’s publisher, brought in Illica in as“script doctor” to salvage much of the text. At Ricordi’s behest,Giacosa also assisted with revising the libretto. Both greatly helpedto make Manon Lescaut a success at the Teatro Regio in Turin onFebruary 1, 1893, and the seeds were planted for their collaborationon La Bohème.

Giulio Ricordi (1840–1912) must be considered the unsung heroin the creation of La Bohème. The most successful member of thefamily dynasty of the House of Ricordi, the Milanese music pub-lishing firm, Giulio printed, among others, the works of Bellini,Donizetti, and Rossini. Marshalling his exquisite skills of diplomacy,charm, and tact, Ricordi gently guided the suspicious and oftencantankerous Verdi out of his retirement after the great success ofAida in 1872, shrewdly inducing the composer to accept ArrigoBoito as his librettist in creating the magnificent operas Otello andFalstaff. Called “Sör Giulio” by Giacosa, the publisher frequentlyinserted himself into the creative process of the libretto for Bohème.

Already an experienced librettist, Luigi Illica (1857–1919) was awriter and successful playwright. A fast worker, he also was easilyoffended and possessed a hot temper, which in one instance led toa duel where he lost half an ear. In working with Puccini, Illicatook source material and transformed it into a prose scenario thatwould be passed onto Giacosa for versification, although he versi-fied some of his own text. One of Illica’s great skills was transform-ing lines of fixed syllables into irregular lengths, a completecontrast to the prevailing practice of standardized poetic meter.Giacosa humorously referred to such text as “Illicasiballi.”

Giuseppe Giacosa (1847–1909) was one of Italy’s leading play-wrights during the last decades of the nineteenth century. Endowedwith an elegant beard and rotund figure, he was known for hisequanimity, earning the sobriquet “the Buddha.” He versifiedIllica’s prose but was a perfectionist and worked slowly to producequality text. Aware of his high standing as a playwright, Giacosadisliked writing librettos, calling the process “pedantic.” It was hardwork and frequently he became exasperated with Puccini’s endlessdemands for changes, leading to voluble letters of resignation thatwere never accepted. At one point, Giacosa complained to Ricordi,“I must confess that with these continual refinements, retouchings,additions, corrections, cuts, restoring the cuts, blowing it up on theright, thinning it out on the left, I am deathly tired.”

Despite Illica’s and Giacosa’s irritation and complaints with thecomposer’s insistence for changes, more often than not Puccini’sinstincts proved him correct. Often, Puccini did not know exactly

what he wanted, but he always had in mind the image of the stageaction which, combined with his music, would create the great the-atrical effect. Often the three artists were summoned to Ricordi’soffice, where they quarreled, hammered out compromises, sug-gested new ideas, cut passages of text, or excised entire acts. Fre-quently, Ricordi applied his diplomatic skills to soothe overheatedpersonalities, resolved artistic differences, and occasionally madehis own contributions to the libretto.

The source of La Bohème derives from Henry Mürger’s Scènes dela vie de Bohème, first serialized over three years beginning in 1845 inthe Parisian journal Le Corsaire de Satan. Théodore Barrière collabo-rated with Mürger in adapting the short stories into a five-act play,La Vie de Bohème, which premiered to great success at the Théâtredes Variétés on November 22, 1849 with Louis Napoleon in theaudience. Two years later, Scènes de la vie de Bohème appeared in bookform in which Mürger added a preface and rearranged many ofthe short stories. Mürger’s semi-autobiographical charactersketches captured much of the 1840s Parisian milieu of Mont-marte and the Latin Quarter. The author imagined himself asRodolphe, an impoverished, starving writer. Many of the othercharacters are composites of known figures of the period thatwould provide a wealth of material for the opera.

AsManon Lescaut approached completion in 1892, it seems thatIllica introduced Puccini to Mürger’s novel. Puccini was enthusias-tic and asked Illica and Giacosa to create the libretto. At the sametime Ruggiero Leoncavallo, the composer of Pagliacci, announcedhis intention to write an opera also based on Mürger’s novel. Acontretemps ensued, and in the end Leoncavallo’s La Bohème pre-miered at Venice’s Teatro la Fenice in 1897, eighteen months afterPuccini’s opera. Despite a string of moderate successes, whichincluded a production at the Vienna Court Opera under GustavMahler’s personal direction, Leoncavallo’s opera was eclipsed byPuccini’s version and disappeared from the repertory.

Early in 1893, Illica quickly drafted the scenario and sent it toGiacosa. The original scenario called for five scenes in four acts. ActI, scene 1: the garret and the Bohemians; scene 2: the Latin Quarterin Café Momus; Act II: at the Barrière d’Enfer; Act III: the court-yard of Musetta’s domicile; Act IV: the garret and Mimi’s death.Newly discovered documents have revealed far more details that donot appear in the finished product. Only the high points can beoffered here, but the details are available in the excellent publicationby Arthur Groos and Roger Parker La Bohème, part of the Cam-bridge Opera Handbooks series (Cambridge, 1986).

Many of the events in the garret of the first and last acts arebased on chapters of Mürger’s novel. Marcel’s painting of theparting of the Red Sea appears in chapter 7, and chapter 9 relatesRodolfo burning his manuscript to keep the garret warm. Chapter19 shows the Bohemians duping their landlord, but the nameBenoît comes only from the play. Mimì is actually a composite oftwo characters from the novel. Rodolfo’s first encounter with Mimìis taken from chapter 18 with the artist Jacques and the seamstressFrancine. Schaunard, not Colline, goes to pawn the overcoat. Inthe novel, Mimì dies alone in a hospital; a stark contrast to theopera’s ending with her death in the garret.

A portrait (from left to right) of Giacomo Puccini and librettists Giuseppe Giacosa and Luigi Illica

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Save for one allusion, Act II has no similarity with the novel.The only reference is to chapter 11, set in “A Café in Bohemia”that takes place inside the Café Momus, not outside, as in theopera. While composing the Act II music, Puccini came up with amusical theme that had no text. Giuseppe Adami, an early biogra-pher of Puccini, gleefully relates the composer explaining to Gia-cosa how he envisioned setting the text to music:

… in his musical work, [Puccini] feels an impetus and excite-ment that Giacosa does not feel. He has his ‘busy hours inwhich the hand is slow to follow the mind.’ Having found sit-uations and scenes, if the verses are lacking, he sets the situa-tions to music, as he always did…. The words will comelater and can adapt to already fixed rhythms.

From time to time, he makes a trip to Milan. He needsthe verses for Musetta. He has already composed the famousWaltz. He sings it again and again to Giacosa, pacing upand down his studio in Foro Bonaparte like a Napoleon whomust overcome every obstacle in that of the obstinate musi-cal ear of his great collaborator. To make things clear, hewrites the meter he wants:

‘Look, you must do me some verses that correspond tothese words: Cocoricò, Cocoricò, bistecca [cock-a-doodle-do,cock-a-doodle-do, beefsteak]. The poet turns pale, shudders,groans. But the next day the lines [of Musetta’s text] areadapted precisely to the music:

‘Quando me’n vo – quando me’n vo – soletta…’Giacomo pockets the verses. He smiles, satisfied: ‘Well

then. Now we’re there… as you see, it really was so simple.’

The original Act III, “Courtyard of a house at 8 rue deBruyère” was to have been a grand social gathering hosted byMusetta and was derived from an episode in Mürger’s novel. Richly

detailed with many people, the act opened with the Bohemians,including Mimì, appearing at the entrance to the courtyard. At thesame instance, Musetta throws out bailiffs who attempted to repos-sess her furniture for non-payment of the rent. In short, portersarrive to carry out the furniture, and Musetta decides to throw aparty and invites the residents of the building with the courtyard.Amidst the milling people, Mimì is charmed by a Viscount, creatinga jealous row with Rodolfo and, at the end of the act, they separate.

It appears the entire act was cut in part because Puccini disliked it.Further, the act itself held up the progress of the dramatic action anddid not fit with the overall structure of the opera. Not all of the mate-rial from the deleted act was lost. Some of the ideas were recycledelsewhere, the most prominent beingMusetta’s introduction of Mimìto a group of students: “She is calledMimì / but her name is Lucia.”These lines were revised to become a part of Mimì’s magnificent ariain Act I as “Mi chiamanoMimì / ma il mio nome è Lucia.”

The scene of “Barrière d’Enfer” at the outskirts of Paris nowbecomes Act III and appears to be invented entirely by Illica. At first,Puccini disliked the act (causing Illica to feel insulted and leading toanother series of explosions and arguments), for it was laden with fartoo many details and thus risking a break in the dramatic flow. HereRicordi offered many valuable suggestions for cuts and refinementsin the libretto, including that Musetta should sing her waltz reminis-cence from inside the tavern. Eventually Illica was soothed by Puc-cini and Ricordi, and the collaboration proceeded further.

In the last act, the collaboration again nearly went awry due toSchaunard’s expanded character. Originally, the libretto included ahumorous episode of Schaunard inveighing against sexual politics,diplomats, and economic reform stopped only by one of theBohemians’ kick to his groin. Schaunard was also to have a mockcredo against women and a drinking song in praise of water. Gia-cosa was never enamored of the act as it stood and refused to giveinto Puccini’s stubborn demands for changes. Illica stepped in, and

Left and below: Childhood friends Luciano Pavarotti and MirellaFreni both made their San Francisco Opera debuts as Rodolfoand Mimì in 1967 (left). The pair reprised their roles for the 1988production (below).

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expended the time and energy to create the required verses. But itwas too much. Everyone was exhausted, and in the end, all real-ized the scene held up the dramatic progress to Mimì’s finalentrance. All of Schaunard’s solos were deleted and the librettofurther revised to include the clowning and mock swordfightbetween Schaunard and Colline.

The work on the libretto cost the poets, the composer, andRicordi much paper, effort, and frayed nerves. Nonetheless, Gia-cosa and Illica skillfully captured much of the rich natural lan-guage and ambience expressed in Mürger’s sketches and the playthat reflected the social lives of the inhabitants of Paris in the1840s together with details of the scenic action. The librettistsadded to the libretto a short extract from Mürger’s foreword aswell as their own, along with several character descriptions fromthe novel. Here follow several samples from the 1897 Englishtranslation of the libretto by W. Grist and P. Pinkerton:

Act I: …Mimi was a charming girl specially apt to appealto Rudolph, the poet and dreamer. Aged twenty-two, shewas slight and graceful. Her face reminded one of somesketch of highborn beauty; its features had marvelous refine-ment… This frail beauty allured Rudolph. But what whollyserved to enchant him were Mimi’s tiny hands, that, despiteher household duties, she contrived to keep whiter even thanthe Goddess of Ease.

Act II: …Gustave Colline, the great philosopher; Marcel,the great painter; Rudolph, the great poet, and Schaunard, thegreat musician as they were wont to style themselves…Made-

moiselle Musetta was a pretty girl of twenty…Very coquettish,rather ambitious, but without any pretensions to spelling.

Act III: Either as a congenital defect or as a naturalinstinct, Musetta possessed a positive genius for elegance…Even in her cradle this strange creature must surely haveasked for a mirror… Intelligent, shrewd, and above all, hos-tile to anything that she considered tyranny, she had but onerule—caprice… In truth the only man that she really lovedwas Marcel; perhaps because he alone could make her suf-fer. Yet extravagance was for her one of the conditions ofwell-being.

Act IV: And Mimi, too, no word of her had Rudolphever heard except when he talked about her to himself whenhe was alone… One day, as Marcel furtively kissed a bunchof ribbons that Musetta had left behind, he saw Rudolphhiding away a bonnet, that same pink bonnet which Mimihad forgotten.

La Bohème successfully premiered with Arturo Toscanini conduct-ing at Turin’s Teatro Regio on February 1, 1896, with twenty-fourperformances in two months. Puccini, however, was not completelysatisfied and continued to refine the libretto. Not until April 13,1896 at its first performances at Palermo’s Teatro Carolino did LaBohème achieve its breakthrough to international fame and fortune.Affirmed by Giacosa and Illica in their preface to the librettotogether with Puccini’s superb music, Mürger’s observation of theBohemians holds true today: vie charmante et vie terrible—”A gay life,and a terrible one.”

San Francisco Opera’s first Mimì was Queena Mario in 1923. Thesoprano signed this photo “To my dear friends Mr. and Mrs.Merola, with love and affectionate wishes for every good thing.”

Mary Costa sang the role of Musetta four times with San FranciscoOpera. She is pictured here between acts while on tour with theCompany in 1962.

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